Film
Little Joe (12A)
Dir. Jessica Hausner, UK/Austria/Germany, 2019, 105 mins. Cast. Emily Beecham, Ben Whishaw, Kerry Fox.
Austrian director Jessica Hausner's first English language feature is a sci-fi horror about a genetically engineered plant designed to lift peoples' moods. Emily Beecham (Best Actress award at Cannes for her performance) stars as Alice, a botanist and single mother who, along with her lab partner Chris, engineers a crimson flower whose scent induces happiness. As it grows, however, Alice suspects that her new creation might not be so harmless, and it might even have an agenda all of its own. An unnerving, philosophical experiment that shakes assumptions around how and why we medicate and how we manage our emotions, Little Joe is a witty and unsettling metaphor for the age of Big Pharma.
Austrian director Jessica Hausner's first English language feature is a sci-fi horror about a genetically engineered plant designed to lift peoples' moods. Emily Beecham (Best Actress award at Cannes for her performance) stars as Alice, a botanist and single mother who, along with her lab partner Chris, engineers a crimson flower whose scent induces happiness. As it grows, however, Alice suspects that her new creation might not be so harmless, and it might even have an agenda all of its own. An unnerving, philosophical experiment that shakes assumptions around how and why we medicate and how we manage our emotions, Little Joe is a witty and unsettling metaphor for the age of Big Pharma.